I can understand how it would happen. Cyclists on tour automatically open up to other cyclists while on the road. I find it so easy to make friends while on tour. Especially at campsites. Do a tour the options are unlimited should you choose to take advantage of them.

Touring has opened my eyes to the American car culture. By that I mean the great extent to which our lives revolve around the automobile. Before, Like most people I just took it for granted, not appreciating that there could even be another way of life. Now I not only can envision an alternative to the car culture, I also see how degenerate it is. The automobile -- along with the t.v. -- is perhaps the most anti-social invention ever. Since humans are social beings, the car has alienated us from our natural state and sickened our entire society.

Since returning from my first big tour in May, I've tried to give up driving altogether. A couple of weeks ago, I drove about an hour to a bike race, and found it a very stressful experience. My mind had just become unaccustomed to it I guess.

My TransAm tour back in 1998 changed my life. Afterwards, I decided to write up the journey as a website, which turned out to be crazyguyonabike.com (that original journal is at http://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/1). I didn't start out intending it to take over my life, but that's how it turned out!

Yeah, touring really does alter your perspective of the automobile. I try to use my car as little as possible anymore, and mainly use it to drive longer distances such as from home to college.

I used to think of driving as something normal and necessary, now I see it as more of a luxury. I still think cars are useful in some situations and can be used responsibly and intelligently, but much of the population abuses this luxury as if oil will never run out.

I drive much differently now, taking it slower, accelerating more gradually, ect... Some people may say I drive slow, but when your used to moving across the earth at ~12 mph all day long, going 45-55 mph is very fast.

Quit my job for my first bike tour, which resulted in switching from being a full time cube-slave to a part-time contractor, I work way less.
Met my boyfriend of 4 years on a bike tour.
Learned a lot of life-lessons on bike tours.

TBD To Be determined. A local bike-hike-kayak touring company let me come along on a short tour as an unpaid helper. Apparently I did well and I have been asked to continue as a part-time "Independent Contractor". Not a lot of cash but it will be nice to get paid for what I would do for free until I can find a Real job.

Yeah, one of my tours radically changed my life. I was an diehard single - NEVER intended to get married. I ended up spending a year cycling around Pakistan, India, Nepal, and Bangladesh with a man - and we got married once we returned to the US. Since then we've continued to tour all over the world - and are currently pedaling from Alaska to Argentina with our kids in tow!!

WE DID IT! Our little family of four cycled 17,300 miles from Alaska to Argentina! The trip of a lifetime for sure. www.familyonbikes.org

Hmmm

I took a "vacation" trip San Francisco to San Diego and LOVED it. Went on to have lots of yard sales and headed east. Wound up spending about 1 1/2 years on a bike. I currently live in Key West and I'm seriously considering doing it all over again.

I don't know if this really counts as a life-changer, but I just went on my first tour this summer, from Seattle to the San Juans and back in six days, and, as a result of the tour's "rigors", I am no longer engaged.

Even my fairly modest initial tour has whetted my appetite for more, though. I'm doing another short tour this summer, and next year I'm going to try to go from Seattle to SF and back.